Paying dead people

Two agencies of the USDA - Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) and Risk Management Agency (RMA) - have made payments to people who have been dead a year or more.  This is despite internal control standards that require them to validate their payments.  GAO examined the records for both agencies from fiscal 2008 to April 2012 and found that NRCS made $10.6 million payments on behalf of 1,103 deceased individuals 1 year or more after their death and RMA paid $22 million in subsidies and allowances  on behalf of an estimated 3,434 program policyholders 2 or more years after death.